The Negotiating Committee is providing this update to the AMFA membership at Southwest Airlines. This report is the only official authorized written source of negotiating communications by the Committee.

During our last session of talks on April 21, 2015, the respective committees tentatively scheduled a two-day session for June 3 and 4, 2015. At that time, the Company said they were not sure if they would be ready to give us anything new on the remaining open items in their supposal. Then on May 27, the Company emailed our Committee the Company’s status of remaining issues to be resolved in these negotiations; four items are within the supposal and they are leads within Article 4: Classifications, sixteen hour duty limit in a 24-hour period, and additional holidays in Article 6: Overtime and Holidays, and bumping rights due to a reduction in force in Article 9: Seniority. They also identified three other articles that have not been discussed: Article 14: Wage Rules; Article 15: Wage Rates, and Article 29: Duration. The Company asked our Committee to electronically send them what we planned to present during the June 3 and 4 dates. We informed the Company we would be using one of the two days scheduled to prepare and we would meet on June 4.

On Tuesday June 2, 2015, our Committee worked up counters on the four remaining issues in the supposal. First, on the lead issue we proposed to keep the two current leads in Dallas and that any future lead position would be filled by seniority, and that future leads would be under a hundred and eighty day trial period to demonstrate their ability to perform the job; we also proposed that there would be no requirement to back fill a lead position unless the ratio dictated and that management may provide instructions directly to technicians if a lead is unavailable. Second, on the sixteen hour duty limit issue we agreed that the Company will not force technicians to work more than sixteen hours in a 24-hour period, and technicians should have no right or expectation of being allowed to work more than sixteen hours in a 24-hour day. In return we proposed that if the technician works sixteen hours in a 24-hour period and is unable to return to work because of rest requirements, the technician will be paid from their normal start time. Third, we withdrew our proposal for additional holidays. Fourth, on bump rights due to reduction in force, we held our position that an employee may displace the most junior employee in any city of his choice. We sent these proposals in the afternoon on June 2 for the Company to review. They replied that they would be unable to respond to us on the fourth, but stated they believed we were very close to resolving these issues and that they plan to respond during our next session along with proposing Wage Rules, Wage Rates, and Duration of Agreement.

Our next scheduled session is for a two-day session which will commence on June 22, 2015. If you have any questions, please call your Local Representative or the Region I or II Director.